10 Minute Guide to Outlook 97 - 21 - Sharing Data with Office Applications In this lesson, you learn to share data between Outlook and other Office applications. Creating a New Office Document You can create a new Office document from within Outlook; for example, you can write a letter, write a report, create a spreadsheet, and so on. To create the document, you work in the actual Office application, such as Word, using that application's tools and features. When you save the document, a shortcut saves to Outlook so you can quickly and easily open the document at any time. To create a new Office document, follow these steps: 1. Choose File, New, Office Document. The New Office Document dialog box appears, as shown in Figure 21.1. Panic Button: I Don't See the New Document Dialog Box In order for this dialog box to appear, Office must be installed and you must have at least one Office template located in the Microsoft Office Templates folder. 2. Select the template for an Excel worksheet or chart, a Word document, or a PowerPoint presentation and click OK. Select one of the options, and the template opens in a document window. Enter and format the text. Then use the menus to check spelling, create pictures, and otherwise manage the document as you would in a word processor. Figure 21.1 Select the document template on which to base your new document. 3. To print the document, choose File, Print. 4. To save the document, choose File, Save As. The Save As dialog box appears. 5. Enter a file name and file type, and choose a location. 6. Choose File, Close to close the document and the document window. The document is added to the Outlook item you were in when you created it. To open the document for editing, printing, or other manipulation, double-click it. Creating an Outlook Item from an Office File You can create an appointment from a Word document, a mail message from an Excel document, or one of many other items by dragging a file to an Outlook item. This capability is great for when you want to include data in a mail message or record items in your journal. Sharing data between Office applications makes your work easier and more efficient. To create an Outlook item from an Office file, follow these steps: 1. Open the Explorer window and the Outlook window so you can see both on-screen at the same time (see Figure 21.2). Figure 21.2 Arrange the two windows on-screen so you can drag from one to the other. 2. In the Explorer window, select the file from which you want to create an Outlook item, and then drag it to the folder in the Outlook Bar. For example, drag a worksheet to the Inbox to create a message. 3. The new item dialog box opens, with the Office file represented as an icon in the item. Enter any details, such as subject, dates, and so on, and then save the item as usual. Timesaver Tip: Shortcut Drag an Outlook item onto the Windows desktop to create a copy of the item that you can open quickly. Importing and Exporting Files You can import files to Outlook and export files from Outlook to other Office applications. When you import, you're opening another Office application's file in a format that Outlook can read so you can use the file's contents in Outlook. When you export, you're saving Outlook data in a format that one of the other Office applications can use. Importing You might import files from Access, FoxPro, dBase, Schedule+, Excel, or some other application for use in Outlook. To import data, follow these steps: 1. In Outlook, choose File, Import and Export. The Import and Export Wizard appears (see Figure 21.3). Figure 21.3 Import files to use in Outlook. Plain English: Wizard In Microsoft Office products, a wizard is a series of dialog boxes containing instructions and options. A wizard helps you complete a task. 2. Choose Import from Schedule+ or Another Program or File and click the Next button. The second wizard dialog box appears. 3. Scroll through the list using the vertical scroll bar if necessary, and choose the type of file you want to import from the list. Click the Next button. Panic Button: Word's Not There! You won't see Microsoft Word on the list, but you can still import a Word file. Select the Comma Separated Values (Windows) option to import a Word file that you've converted to text-only; first you'll have to use Word to save the Word file in Text Only format. 4. In the third wizard dialog box, enter the path and the file name in the File to Import text box, or click the Browse button and select the file from the Browse dialog box. Set any options in the Options area of the dialog box and click the Next button. 5. In the fourth wizard dialog box, select the folder in which you want to import the file and click Next. Exporting You can export Outlook files to Access, Excel, Word, and so on for use with other applications. For example, you might export an e-mail message to Word as a memo, or you might export data from your journal into an Excel worksheet. When you export a file, you're saving the file's contents in a format another application can open and use. To export a file, follow these steps: 1. Select the item you want to export as a file and choose File, Import and Export. The Import and Export Wizard dialog box appears. 2. Choose Export to a File and click Next. 3. In the second wizard dialog box, select the folder to export from and click Next. 4. In the third wizard dialog box, select the file type and click Next. 5. In the fourth wizard dialog box, enter the path and name of the file to be exported, and then click Next. 6. Select a destination folder and click Next. Linking and Embedding Objects You can use Windows OLE to share data between Office appli-cations. Object Linking and Embedding is a feature that most Windows applications support. OLE enables you to share data between a source application and a destination application, ensuring that all documents are updated automatically and in a timely fashion. For example, you can link an Excel worksheet to a mail message to ensure that the data you send with the message is up-to-date and accurate. You also can embed objects into mail messages in Outlook. One of the biggest advantages of using OLE is that you can edit an object by double-clicking it. When you do, the file is updated in both the source and the destination applications with the changes you've made. You can use existing files or create new files for both linking and embedding. Plain English: Linking Creating a bridge between two applications so that the data in one application is copied exactly into the second application and updated automatically whenever changes are made. Embedding Using one application to create an object within another application. Source The application or document in which the object was created. Destination The application or document into which the object is copied or embedded. Object The Word document, Excel worksheet, Outlook note, or other item that is linked or embedded. Linking Objects Outlook enables you to link data between two or more applications when you want to ensure that all data is kept up-to-date automatically. If, for example, you link an Excel worksheet to an Outlook message, each time you make a change to the numbers in the worksheet, those numbers also change in the linked data in the message. To link an object between Outlook and another application, follow these steps: 1. In Outlook, create a new mail message or reply, and then place the insertion point in the body of the message. 2. Choose Insert, Object. The Object dialog box appears. 3. Choose the Create from File tab. The Object dialog box changes to look like the one shown in Figure 21.4. Figure 21.4 Create a link to an existing object. 4. Enter the path and file name of the object you want to link in the File Name text box, or click the Browse button and select the file. 5. Select the Link check box and click OK. Outlook inserts a copy of the object in the message text. The link remains--guaranteeing updated information--until you send the message. Embedding Objects You might want to embed a new or existing file, such as a Word table and text, into an e-mail message to send to someone in your company. When you embed the data, the recipient has only to double-click the embedded object to open, read, edit, and/or print the file's contents. Note, however, that embedded data (unlike linked data) isn't updated when a source file changes. To embed an object in Outlook, follow these steps: 1. In Outlook, create a new mail message or reply, and then place the insertion point in the body of the message. 2. Choose Insert, Object. The Insert Object dialog box appears. 3. Choose Create New, and a list of available Object Types appears in the dialog box. 4. Select the object type you want and click OK. Windows inserts a window into the message, from which you can create a document, spreadsheet, chart, or other object. For example, if you choose to insert a spreadsheet, Windows creates a window within the message that looks like an Excel worksheet. In addition, the Outlook message window changes to look similar to Excel's, as shown in Figure 21.5. When you finish entering data, click outside of the frame to return to Outlook. At any time, you can double-click anywhere in the frame to edit the data. Panic Button: Why the Entire Excel Workbook? If you create an object from an existing Excel workbook, Outlook inserts the whole workbook into the item. You can only display one worksheet at a time, however. Double-click the Excel object to choose a different worksheet. Figure 21.5 Create a worksheet from within an Outlook message. In this lesson, you learned to share data between Outlook and other Office applications. In the next lesson, you'll learn to archive items.

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